How good is Man of Steel? So good that apparently, Warners has decided to pull the trigger on Justice League, with Zack Snyder directing, Christopher Nolan as producer… and, supposedly, Christian Bale as Batman.

Warner Bros. is handing the DC Universe reins over to Christopher Nolan, Zack Snyder and David Goyer. The tentative plan is for Snyder to direct JUSTICE LEAGUE from a story devised by Nolan and Goyer. Snyder’s deal isn’t in place, but considering how ecstatic everyone at WB is about MAN OF STEEL, the studio will make that deal.

If you haven’t been following the hype about Man of Steel, by all accounts DC has finally cracked what makes a Superman movie appeal to a larger audience. Superman Returns is a great Superman movie in a lot of ways, especially in the sense that it’s got a dryly funny tone and an understanding the only real way to wound Superman is emotionally, but people wanted to see him hit something, and by all accounts, Snyder’s movie delivers.

It’s not surprising: Watchmen was not a movie he should have directed, but the first twenty minutes are a superb superhero movie, and even though Snyder was completely wrong for the material, he still turned out a watchable, solid adaptation. Considering he’s pretty well aligned with Superman, it’s not surprising he delivered a movie worth watching.

Our first question is, at that price range, will this be Justice League or World’s Finest? Because Bale playing Batman, what with the whole “Hey, every time I growl you make a billion dollars” thing, is decidedly not cheap. And while bringing Bale and Nolan on board fixes most of what we foresaw as a problem for the Justice League movie, we can’t help thinking this would be the Clark and Bruce Show anyway.

Our second question is how soon until you can take our money, Warners?

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This seems pretty far-fetched. How do you justify him passing on the cowl and then taking it back? Or is it the same actor in a different DC universe? Too many ways it doesn’t make sense, but then, you know, lots of money probably makes it perfectly fine in the studio’s mind. Neither Nolan nor Bale strike me as the type to dip his quill in the same ink twice in this manner, though.

As Filmdrunk linked to Latino Review, Bale is on record saying that if Nolan came to him with a 4th story that he said was worth doing, he’d be on board. So if Nolan is on board, then Bale’s creative incentive is there and all his agent needs to do is figure out the $$$ to get Bale to undertake this role that has made WB easily $1.5 Billion +. If Nolan is the Whedon of DCU, then this is a huge win for WB. I think we still have to see Man of Steel because I don’t know if a gritty JL works. Hopefully this mean MoS is fun and translates better to a team up.

But if this is World’s Finest instead of JL that gets really interesting with the way it could go.. WF could probably handle a more serious tone than JL and be completely awesome. But like it’s brought up (by me and others) any JL movie needs GL, Flash, WW either setting it up or coming up right after. They’ll need a well developed villain to push the character developments of those 3 back until they get the solo movie treatment that Marvel gave everyone. Still wanna see this all in writing from WB or Nolan, especially if they’re thinking MoS is a huge hit….

My first inclination is to not like this. I like the Nolan trilogy as a self-contained universe. Too little would make sense given the ending of DKR and, if they decide to go with a multiverse approach, expounding to the audience that Bale-As-Batman isn’t the same as *THAT* Bale-As-Batman sounds complicated.

Paraphrasing from another comment elsewhere, but what if Supes comes asking Bruce for help, Bruce says “No, but I know someone who can”
Cue Bale training JGL, to have him take over the cowl besides Cavill for the second half of the flick and into Justice League and possibly his own standalones.

Maybe Superman explains all the plot holes from DKR… How did Bruce get from the prison to Gotham in under a day? Superman. How did Batman survive the blast? Superman… Who designed the flawlessly executed batman symbol to be lit up? Yup you guessed it… Frank Stallone.

I always get a kick out of the bat symbol being argued as a plot hole. All cape comics and material based therein have incredible amounts of plot holes if we’re setting the threshold there. As for surviving the explosion…he probably had a mini-fridge in the plane that he jumped into.

Even if Man of Steel works they are probably better off doing a Batman V. Superman film than a whole Justice League. Unless Justice league does what most people are screaming for and forgoing an origin story for the others.

I’m glad someone else can admit that Superman Returns was a decent movie, the only real issue is he never punched anyone once.

I’m cool with this, but I’m worried Warner Brothers is missing the point of the Justice League, it requires a League Yes, it’s a given you have to have Batman, Supes, and Wonder Woman, but your Flash, GL, and anyone else thing add (i really hope they throw in Martian Manhunter and either Hawkgirl or Black Cannery) need to be fleshed out as well. That’s what made the Avengers so great. Everyone was expecting it to be the Iron Man show with his two blond-haired sidekicks, but the movie worked because everyone felt like they added something to it.

I think Snyder and Nolan can do this if it’s true, but it’s going to have to require the studio to give them the breathing room they need to make it work.